No Priors: Artificial Intelligence | Technology | Startups

In this week’s episode of No Priors, Sarah and Elad sit down with the Google DeepMind team behind AlphaProof, Laurent Sartran, Rishi Mehta, and Thomas Hubert. AlphaProof is a new reinforcement learning-based system for formal math reasoning that recently reached a silver-medal standard in solving International Mathematical Olympiad problems. They dive deep into AI and its role in solving complex mathematical problems, featuring insights into AlphaProof and its capabilities. They cover its functionality, unique strengths in reasoning, and the challenges it faces as it scales. The conversation also explores the motivations behind AI in math, practical applications, and how verifiability and human input come into play within a reinforcement learning approach. The DeepMind team shares advice and future perspectives on where math and AI are headed. 

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Show Notes: 

0:00 Personal introductions

2:19 Achieving silver medal in IMO competition

3:52 How AlphaProof works

5:56 AlphaProof’s strengths within mathematical reasoning

8:56 Challenges in scaling AlphaProof

13:40 Why solve math?

17:50 Pursuing knowledge versus practical applications

21:30 Insights on verifying correctness within reinforcement learning

28:27 How AI could foster more collaboration among mathematicians

30:28 Surprising insights from AI proof generation

34:17 Future of math and AI: advice for math enthusiasts and researchers

In this week’s episode of No Priors, Sarah and Elad sit down with Jensen Huang, CEO of NVIDIA, for the second time to reflect on the company’s extraordinary growth over the past year. Jensen discusses AI’s takeover of datacenters and NVIDIA’s rapid development of x.AI’s supercluster. The conversation also covers Nvidia’s decade-long infrastructure bets, software longevity, and innovations like NVLink. Jensen shares his views on the future of embodied AI, digital employees, and how AI is transforming scientific discovery.

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Show Notes: 

00:00 Introduction

1:22 NVIDIA's 10-year bets

2:28 Outpacing Moore’s Law

3:42 Data centers and NVLink

7:16 Infrastructure flexibility for large-scale training and inference 

10:40 Building and optimizing data centers 

13:30 Maintaining software and architecture compatibility 

15:00 X.AI’s supercluster 

18:55 Challenges of super scaling data centers

20:39 AI’s role in chip design 

22:23 NVIDIA's market cap surge and company evolution 

27:03 Embodied AI

28:33 AI employees

31:25 Impact of AI on science and engineering 

35:40 Jensen’s personal use of AI tools

In this week’s episode of No Priors, Sarah sits down with Tarek Mansour, CEO of Kalshi—the first CFTC-regulated prediction market exchange in the U.S. They dive into Kalshi’s recent victory to legalize election betting, explore ethical questions around trading on elections, and discuss whether prediction markets can offer more accuracy than traditional polls. Tarek shares insights on the history of futures markets, the line between gambling and financial trading, and the psychology behind betting. Plus, Sarah makes a live election bet, and Tarek reveals some of Kalshi’s most intriguing markets.

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Show Notes: 

0:00 Introduction

1:22 Sarah makes a live election bet on Kalshi

3:35 Getting approved and regulated by CFTC

5:48 Going up against the CFTC to legalize election betting

7:21 Debating the ethics of trading on elections

8:12 Gambling vs. trading 

9:12 Context and purpose of futures markets

12:38 The human psychology behind speculating /Humans conditioned to risk taking

17:17 Building a healthy exchange and scaling liquidity 

19:30 Introducing leverage and working with clearinghouses

22:29 Polls vs. prediction markets

24:59 Conditional markets

26:38 What makes Kalshi’s markets accurate

31:29 Tarek’s insights on the most interesting trades and markets on the platform

In this episode of No Priors, Dmitri Dolgov, Co-CEO of Waymo, joins Sarah and Elad to explore the evolution and advancements of Waymo's self-driving technology from its inception at Google to its current real-world deployment. Dmitri also shares insights into the technological breakthroughs and complexities of achieving full autonomy, the design innovations of Waymo’s sixth generation driverless cars, and the broader applications of Waymo’s advanced technology. They also discuss Waymo's strategic approach to scaling amidst regulation, deployment in cities like Phoenix and San Francisco, and the transformative potential of autonomous driving on car ownership and urban infrastructure.

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Shownotes:

00:00 Introduction

00:15 History of Self-Driving at Google 

00:29 DARPA Challenges and Early Involvement 

01:39 Formation of Waymo 

01:53 Industry Lineage and Early Skepticism 

03:05 Initial Goals and Milestones 

4:33 Pivot to Full Autonomy 

04:50 Scaling and Deployment 

05:29 Generational Breakthroughs 

06:59 Choosing Deployment Cities 

09:26 Technological Advancements 

11:01 Evaluating Safety 

14:41 Regulatory Stance and Trust 

16:52 Future of Autonomous Driving 

23:19 Business Strategy and Partnerships 

26:06 Changing Urban Mobility Trends 

26:40 Challenges and Misconceptions in Self-Driving Timelines 

28:43 The Role of Traditional OEMs in an Autonomous Future 

30:54 Designing Cars for Autonomous Ride-Hailing 

33:42 Scaling Responsibly 

35:18 Generalizability and Future Applications of AI 

37:10 The Complexity of Achieving Full Autonomy 

42:58 The Importance of Data and Iteration in AI Development 

46:13 Reflecting on the Journey and Future of Waymo

In this episode of No Priors, Sarah and Elad explore how AI is transforming consumer apps and entertainment, with a focus on potential integrations in gaming and dating that could shift traditional societal incentives. They reflect on AI researchers winning Nobel Prizes in Science and Chemistry for the first time, discussing what this trend means for scientific discovery. The episode also covers recent AI releases, including their thoughts on OpenAI’s O1 model and Google’s NotebookLM, and examines which companies and job functions are most at risk—or resilient—in the face of AI advancements.

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Show Notes: 

(0:00) Introduction

(0:47) Google releases NotebookLM 

(5:20) Integrating AI into consumer apps and gaming

(9:11) Future of AI companionship and procreation

(14:45) OpenAI o1 model improves on iterative reasoning

(18:06) Sarah and Elad reflect on Nobel Prizes going to AI researchers

(21:23) Jobs and businesses at risk of disruption

(27:18) AI-durable companies

Today on No Priors, Elad is joined by Ankur Goyal, founder and CEO of Braintrust. Braintrust enables companies like Notion, Airtable, Instacart, Zapier, and Vercel to deploy AI solutions at scale by efficiently evaluating and managing complex, non-deterministic AI applications. Ankur shares his insights into emerging trends in the use of AI tooling and coding languages, the rise of open-source, and the future of data infrastructure. Ankur also reflects on building resilient AI products, his philosophy on coding as a CEO, and the importance of a startup’s initial customer base. 

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Show Notes: 

(0:00) Introduction

(0:38) Ankur’s path to Braintrust

(3:05) Braintrust’s solution

(5:46) AI tooling trends 

(7:58) Instruction tuning vs. fine-tuning

(8:57) Open-source AI adoption 

(10:42) Future of data infrastructure and synthetic data

(14:45) Designing technical interviews

(18:04) Rethinking agent-based approaches

(19:34) Building out an AI team

(23:35) Typescript as the language of AI

(25:12) The shift away from using frameworks

(26:02) Vendor consolidation among enterprises 

(27:16) Coding as a CEO 

(30:16) Collaborating with customers

(33:00) Future of Braintrust and evals

Lina Khan’s FTC has been the most active in decades, notably challenging tech giants and adopting a more hands-on approach to regulating the digital age. On today’s episode of No Priors, Lina Khan joins Elad and Sarah to discuss her regulatory philosophy for tech markets and what the industry can expect for future M&A deals. She shares her approach to overseeing emerging technology sectors, including AI at the model layer, and her work to ban non-competes on a federal level. Khan also offers insights into the realities of leading a government agency, the scarcity of young leaders in power, and how she measures the FTC’s impact.

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Show Notes: 

(0:00) Introduction

(0:56) Lina Khan’s background and path to the FTC

(2:35) Amazon’s Antitrust Paradox

(4:20) Frameworks for regulating M&A in young markets

(8:50) Khan’s perspective on AI acquisitions

(12:18) What founders can expect from Khan’s M&A environment 

(14:55) Promoting competition at the large model layer

(17:01) Creating fair AI regulation

(18:40) FTC’s work to ban non-competes

(20:31) Why so few young people hold power in government today

(22:18) The realities of running a government agency

(24:20) Measuring the impact of FTC

In this episode of No Priors, Sarah and Elad sit down with Matt MacInnis, COO of Rippling, to discuss the company’s unique product strategy and the advantages of being a compound startup. Matt introduces Talent Signal, Rippling’s AI-powered employee performance tool, and explains how early adopters are using it to gain a competitive edge. They explore Rippling’s approach to choosing which AI products to build and how they plan to leverage their rich data sources. The conversation also delves into how AI shapes real-world decision-making and how to realistically integrate these tools into organizational workflows.

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Show Notes: 

0:00 Introduction

0:32 Rippling’s mission and product offerings

2:13 Compound startups

3:53 Evaluating human performance with Talent Signal 

13:19 Incorporating AI evaluations into decision-making at Rippling

14:56 Leveraging work outputs as inputs for models

18:23 How Rippling chose which AI product to build first

20:53 Building out bundled products

23:26 Merging and scaling diverse data sources

25:16 Early adopters and integrating AI into decision-making processes

Bret Taylor, Cofounder of Sierra, Chairman of the board at OpenAI, and former co-CEO of Salesforce and CTO of Facebook, joins Sarah and Elad in this week’s episode of No Priors. Bret discusses building company-branded AI agents with unique personalities, goals, and guardrails at Sierra, and their potential to revolutionize customer engagement while cutting costs. The conversation explores the next sectors for enterprise AI adoption, building resilient AI products, and the parallels between today’s AI market and the evolution of the cloud industry. Bret also shares his unique insights on future business models and upcoming technology shifts.

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Show Notes:

(0:00) Intro

(0:42) Defining agentic systems and types of agents

(3:55) Customer-facing company agents

(5:43) Sierra AI

(8:11) Transforming customer service and reducing costs

(9:57) Challenges in implementing LLMs for company agents

(14:45) Drawing parallels between AI and the cloud market’s evolution

(17:50) Future of the AI landscape

(19:15) Building durable AI products

(24:39) Outcome-based business models and tangible ROI in AI solutions

(29:22) Next wave of AI sectors for enterprise adoption

(31:15) Customizing goals and guardrails with customers

(35:55) Creating distinct personalities for Sierra's agents

(41:05) Bret’s insights on upcoming technology and hardware shifts

(46:50) How AI software could enhance human agency

In this episode of No Priors, Sarah and Elad go deep into what's on everyone’s mind. They break down new partnerships and consolidation in the LLM market, specialization of AI models, and AMD’s strategic moves. Plus, Elad is looking for a humanoid robot. 

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Follow us on Twitter: @NoPriorsPod | @Saranormous | @EladGil 

Show Notes:

(0:00) Introduction

(0:24) LLM market consolidation 

(2:18) Competition and decreasing API costs

(3:58) Innovation in LLM productization 

(8:20) Comparing  the LLM and social network market

(11:40) Increasing competition in image generation

(13:21) Trend in smaller models with higher performance

(14:43) Areas of innovation

(17:33) Legacy of AirBnB and Uber pushing boundaries

(24:19) AMD Acquires ZT 

(25:49) Elad’s looking for a Robot